Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Please Help with Fish ID

I posted a thread about stocking predators a few days ago in the "Corrective Stocking" program. The story of the pond is there.

Are these the same species?

Also, what is this?

Is this a green sunfish?



And is this a warmouth?

Thanks for the help.

Boy these ARE good questions...I think the top two ARE the same species....
I think the third is a GOLDEN shinner if I'm not mistaken...
The forth one is a pumkinseed...I Think.
The last one is a Green sunfish..not sure on this one either..

One of the Big boys come chime in and correct me on this!!

Boy, this is gonna be fun - see how many ya' can get right (whatever right is). Here's my shots:

#1 Bluegill, healthy looking

#2 Colored like a Bluegill, very short body (top to bottom) for the length, HUGE eye wrt body size - I will say very malnourished Bluegill.

#3 Definitely a Golden Shiner - I've got a million of 'em (literally)

#4 I'm going to say Pumpkinseed, but I cheated and copied off big_pond (otherwise I'd be making a WAG)

#5 Definitely Green Sunfish

Nice pics, huntinut. As far as corrective stocking, adding LMB and HSB will definitely help reduce the GSF numbers and increase BG size. They will also eat the GShiners, which are really good forage for Bass.

I always loved cold tests with no studying first - this was fun. Now, Cody/Condello/Cecil/ML/etc, tell me where I was wrong.

huntinut, great pictures. A book that you might like is "Fishes of Arkansas" by Henry W. Robinson and Thomas M. Buchanan. U. of Arkansas Press, ISBN 1-55728-000-2 hardback and 1-55728-001-0 paperback.

First two are bluegills; next is a golden shiner; then comes a pumpkinseed X green sunfish or pumpkinseed X bluegill or bluegill X green sunfish, and then definitely a green sunfish.

Hybrids can be tough unless you can key out features like gill raker lengths etc.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Here are my guesses.

Male bluegill

Female bluegill

Golden shiner

Pumpkinseed sunfish

Green sunfish

I'm least certain about the fourth guess.

Whatever that third fish is it's not a pure species. Why? If it was a pure pumpkinseed it would have red tip on teh opercle. Natural hybrids among the lepomids are commmon. Keying them out even gives biologists the fits at times.

I think Cecil is right...it looks to be a cross between pumpkinseed and a greenie. The BG on top don't look so good. They look stunted to me. Probably overpopulation of BG and/or underpop of predators.

Regardless...he's cool looking.

What also throws the third fish into a hard to identify category is that pumpkinseeds are not native to Arkansas.

break out the rotenone.

I believe fish #4 is a longear sunfish. These fish get up to perhaps 5 inches or so. The adult males will get a gill-flap tab that is even longer. Generally not much sport fishing quality, but they sure are pretty.

I'm switching to the Willis camp.

LONGEAR SUNFISH

Good job finding that picture, Bruce! That is a nice picture of a breeding male!! [Wonder if they have cuckolds, too?? :-)]

Thx and we need more pic's like these for all the questions we novices have. I know most exp. folks know all these fish by sight, and I did not do too bad, but for the newbies it really helps. Thanks again.

Rotenone ??? 80% of the pond is perfect from my viewpoint, Green sunfish aren't that difficult to weed out, most predators will eat them over bgill.

How many of you would rotenone versus stocking some LMB and HSB?

I'd continue to evaluate all Summer - fish the hell out of it, seine it, observe, maybe set minnow traps - to get as complete a picture as possible on what all's in there. I would not want to spend money on predators or renovating until I was sure. Based on the preliminary info, I'd figure on lining up LMB/HSB for a fall stocking (the bigger the better, I'd want to run bass-heavy for maybe 2-3 years even if trophy bass were my long-term goal), and then I'd do my best to manage it, not renovate.

I would first find a reputable pond/lake manager in your area who can give you an accurate estimate on cost of complete fish eradication. Then I would factor this cost against my level of patience.

i.e. Are the savings of NOT treating with rotenone greater than the value of my TIME waiting to see if predator manipulation is successful?

Some extoll the virtues of patience while others see their lives passing by as they wait. There may be no right answer.

About 5 years ago I stocked a pond with what the dealer recomended. (That was before I discovered this site =( ). Which was channel cat and Hybrd BG (or so I was told). All my non catfish look like, the 5th fish, so was it already there, or is that what I stocked? I also have fish the look of the 4th fish but they are very orange or even a purple color, on the bottom half, and look like a BG on the top half. THanks for help JB.

I'm not very good at fish ID but am trying to learn. The last fish in the picture looks much like my Hybrid BG. I asked a fisheries biologist for the best way to tell a HBG from a bluegill or green sunfish and he said the key traits are the white or orange edging on the lower fins and the bluish purple stripe under the eye. This fish has both.

i still have some HBG in the pond. the easiest way is the bottom fins have yellow and their mouth is 3 times the size as a bluegill. not sure , eat it any ways.